Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

O

orpheo

Well-known member
The first guitar I ever build was my take on the LP Standard: maple top on korina, ebony board on a rosewood neck. The second was a telepaul: ash body, maple bolt on neck, ebony board and tele trimmings. I still have those to this day and I won't change them one little bit due to nostalgic reasons as well as a reminder of how far my work has progressed.

The third one was a TelePaul once more but I never had much love for that one. No particular reason. I build it because I wanted to gain experience in luthiery, carving tops, shaping necks, testing features and techniques and of course have specimens for my soon-to-be-launched website.

I intended to make a range of carved top LP's without a top that would hark back to the sonic palate and features of a tele (nailed that one), a strat and an LP Special.

So, I decided to rework the second TelePaul and make it... a Strat-TelePaul. A Strelepaul! I routed in a trem (strat style), added a humbucker and a middle single coil and voila. There you go. I redid the fretwork too while i was at it. I have to admit: this guitar is a sonic beast. Very balanced tones: going from quacky sounds to cutting rock tones from the humbucker to the slightly-more-airy-than-usual tele neck pickup... very versatile.




 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

Oh, some specs:

hard ash 2 piece carved body
1 piece maple neck
ebony fretboard, 22 frets (shortscale at the moment, 24.75''!)
Wilkinson 5+1 trem with steel block+plate+saddles
Seymour Duncan vintage 54 neck pickup
Seymour Duncan A2Pro middle strat pickup (really, really old one, though)
Seymour Duncan Seth Lover/Alnico2pro hybrid bridge

master volume, master tone, 2 way rotary for splitting the hum and placing the 2 singlecoils in series or separate, 5 way CRL blade (oddly positioned, I know, but I had very little choice due to the initial control cavity which couldn't be modified).

I'll make a wenge pickup ring later, to tie in with the wenge control plate and (recessed) spring cavity cover.
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

orpheo said:
Oh, some specs:

hard ash 2 piece carved body
1 piece maple neck
ebony fretboard, 22 frets (shortscale at the moment, 24.75''!)
Wilkinson 5+1 trem with steel block+plate+saddles
Seymour Duncan vintage 54 neck pickup
Seymour Duncan A2Pro middle strat pickup (really, really old one, though)
Seymour Duncan Seth Lover/Alnico2pro hybrid bridge

master volume, master tone, 2 way rotary for splitting the hum and placing the 2 singlecoils in series or separate, 5 way CRL blade (oddly positioned, I know, but I had very little choice due to the initial control cavity which couldn't be modified).

I'll make a wenge pickup ring later, to tie in with the wenge control plate and (recessed) spring cavity cover.
Click to expand...

not really a fan of rotary switches but in this case. I think I would of either used one or more likely a freeway switch.. just the way id do it.. looks nice though
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

ohh and you need a gold hardware and a gold 'bucker cover:)

gold just looks nice on a natural finish
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

Brandenburg said:
not really a fan of rotary switches but in this case. I think I would of either used one or more likely a freeway switch.. just the way id do it.. looks nice though
Click to expand...

I have used the freeway and that thing isn't an option, at all. I don't like the way it switches, I don't like the feel NOR the pricetag :P the rotary coil split is just an easy choice.

the rotary is JUST for split; not for pickup selection. (I couldn't install a toggle for the split cause the hole was too big :) )
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

orpheo said:
I have used the freeway and that thing isn't an option, at all. I don't like the way it switches, I don't like the feel NOR the pricetag :P the rotary coil split is just an easy choice.

the rotary is JUST for split; not for pickup selection. (I couldn't install a toggle for the split cause the hole was too big :) )
Click to expand...

never used a freeway but it just seemed like it would be better in this situation.. perhaps not

or you could of gone with a LP style toggle for the neck/bridge.. on/off via switch or push/push pot for the middle pup..hehe

dunno why but a lever switch just looks weird on an LP body to me.. but its not my guitar either
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

Brandenburg said:
never used a freeway but it just seemed like it would be better in this situation.. perhaps not

or you could of gone with a LP style toggle for the neck/bridge.. on/off via switch or push/push pot for the middle pup..hehe

dunno why but a lever switch just looks weird on an LP body to me.. but its not my guitar either
Click to expand...

it is a bit odd, true, but a lever switch is by far the better switch if you want to select between more than two pickups in a clean and easy fashion. I've never been much of a fan of tradition if something could be improved. and since I build from scratch.... why not get rid of Gibson ****ty designs and fix them? like... crappy truss rod design, poor timber choices, bad hardware, bad electronics, bad pickups etc?

If i were to build this again I would've used a different control cavity, one that's much more mod-friendly. Oh well... live 'n learn.
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

Still there... Haven't changed the settings or content of photo bucket...
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

They look great, the wood reminds me of a late 70s Ibanez Wier model artist I could not get a mate to sell me.
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

Please post more pics of that, it looks great!
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

orpheo said:
The first guitar I ever build was my take on the LP Standard: maple top on korina, ebony board on a rosewood neck. The second was a telepaul: ash body, maple bolt on neck, ebony board and tele trimmings. I still have those to this day and I won't change them one little bit due to nostalgic reasons as well as a reminder of how far my work has progressed.

The third one was a TelePaul once more but I never had much love for that one. No particular reason. I build it because I wanted to gain experience in luthiery, carving tops, shaping necks, testing features and techniques and of course have specimens for my soon-to-be-launched website.

I intended to make a range of carved top LP's without a top that would hark back to the sonic palate and features of a tele (nailed that one), a strat and an LP Special.

So, I decided to rework the second TelePaul and make it... a Strat-TelePaul. A Strelepaul! I routed in a trem (strat style), added a humbucker and a middle single coil and voila. There you go. I redid the fretwork too while i was at it. I have to admit: this guitar is a sonic beast. Very balanced tones: going from quacky sounds to cutting rock tones from the humbucker to the slightly-more-airy-than-usual tele neck pickup... very versatile.




Click to expand...


This looks wonderful. I am designing a guitar with a similar pickup configuration but with a filtertron in the bridge position as opposed to a humbucker. Are you going to do some audio demos of this guitar?
 
Re: Heavily modified Te-LesPaul -> StrelePaul!

Oh I sure will :) a filtertron (TV Jones) is epic too!
 
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